Hou Hsiao-hsien’s Relatives Confirm Taiwan Film Director’s Retirement, Continuation of Family Business (EXCLUSIVE)

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief The fourth running of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (aka TCCF) wrapped on Friday with the award of some 30 prizes to film and TV projects in five sections. The prizes followed three and a half days of one-on-one meetings and pitching within the context of the TAICCA-backed project, innovation and rights sales market.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Taiwanese production companies DaMou Entertainment and KOKO Entertainment unveiled a starry local cast for “Fired Up,” their Taiwan remake of hit Korean series “Itaewon Class.” At an event held within the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) on Thursday, the two companies also confirmed plans for a second season of “The World Between Us,” a 2019 drama series that premiered on Taiwan’s Public Television Service and regional streamer Catchplay. “Fired Up” will star Mandarin-language pop star Eric Chou, Golden Horse Film Award nominee Angela Yuen, Shao Yu-wei, Huang Guan-zhi, Cosmos Lin, Ben Wu and Sean Lin in leading roles. The show is co-directed by kao Pin-chuan and Tseng Ying-ting, working from a script headed by Chien Li-ying (“Wave Makers”). “Itaewon Class” is a story about an ex-convict who sets up his own business after release from jail.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief France and Taiwan on Thursday signed a wide-ranging agreement to enable their film and TV industries co-operate on a higher level. At a signing ceremony in Taipei at the Taiwan Creative Culture Fest (TCCF) convention, government representatives of both territories stressed shared values at the political level and in the audiovisual sphere.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Adele Lim, the screenwriter behind “Crazy Rich Asians” and Disney’s “Raya and the Last Dragon” animation, says that the opportunities for Asian filmmakers are growing as Hollywood is becoming more receptive to international talent. “[In Hollywood] I felt that I was disadvantaged, coming from Malaysia. It is not the cultural nexus,” said Lim, whose infancy was in Malaysia, before her family moved to the U.S.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief CJ ENM Hong Kong, a unit of South Korea’s CJ ENM, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA), Far EasTone Telecommunications (FET) and local TV network – TVBS to launch a multi-year content fund that would support the co-production and joint distribution of audiovisual content. The “strategic alliance” combines assets including production, distribution and marketing, media networks and technology.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Japanese entertainment conglomerate Kadokawa is seeking to double its international revenues through a strategy of diversification and localization. Taiwan is expected to be a key plank in the outreach, executives at the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) heard on Tuesday. “Currently 20% of Kadokawa’s revenues come from outside Japan. I want to get this figure to 40%,” said Natsuno Takeshi, CEO Kadokawa Corp. Kadokawa has its roots in publishing of comics and other fiction and also has deeply-established roots in film production and distribution.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief A trio of ministers, accompanied by a fleet of senior industry names, were on hand Tuesday in Taipei to give their official blessing to the opening of the fourth running of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) – and to underline the Taiwan government’s investment in soft power. Cheng Wen-tsan, VP of the [government executive branch] Executive Yuan, Taiwan’s Minister of Culture, Shih Che, and a minister without portfolio were accompanied by Chunghwa Telecom’s chairman, Kuo Shui-Yi, head of TAICCA Homme Tsai and Dominique Boutonnat, president of France’s National Center of Cinematography and the Moving Image, on stage at the Songshan Cultural and Creative Park, a former-tobacco factory site that has since been redeveloped. “Nowadays we are investing not only in semiconductors and heavy industry, but also in media and content,” said Cheng. He confirmed that some NT$10 billion ($310 million) of government funding has been approved for the “1 Plus 4T Content Plan” and will be released over four years. In a classic example of public-private partnerships, state cash is being supplemented by further financial commitments from Taiwan’s three major cable-telecoms-internet groups through deals signed last week with Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA).

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Screenworks Asia, the production subsidiary of Taiwan-based streaming platform Catchplay, has set two series to release early next year. “Not A Murder Story” follows a wannabe actor who finally gets a chance of success. And when he wakes up with a dead woman besides him, he is determined not to let it stand in his way.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Unscripted queer reality dating series “Boys Like Boys” is to air on Warner Bros. Discovery’s TLC channel in Taiwan in early 2024, making it the first local LGBTQ+ dating reality show to air on linear TV in the territory. The show is an original production by GagaOOLala, Asia’s out and proud LGBTQ+ streaming service, which is pitching an expanded array of queer content at the Taiwan Creative Contents Fest (TCCF) that launches Tuesday in Taipei. “Boys Like Boys” had its premiere at the Kaohsiung International Film Festival and is now available worldwide on GagaOOLala and WeTV in the Philippines and Thailand, where the ‘Boys Love’ genre has become highly popular.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief TAICCABOSSAs Taiwan seeks for creative, industrial and political reasons to make a bigger mark for itself on the international stage, its Taiwan Creative Content Fest is diversifying, expanding and making greater efforts at cross-border outreach. Homme Tsai, chair of industry support body TAICCA spoke outline the event’s strategy and novelties in a conversation with Variety. What are the objectives of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest? The TCCF is an international event for content licensing and project investment.

Björk has shared that she will start writing her next album in 2024, along with confirming a ‘Cornucopia’ film.The Icelandic artist was reflecting on the process of her ‘Cornucopia’ concert and theatrical production – which has toured across the world from 2019-2023 – in a recent interview, when she revealed that new music is on the horizon for next year.“Well, Cornucopia was a strange project because we did it for a year, and then Covid came for two years,” she told Rolling Stone. “And then we started it again. We’re finishing it now around Christmas.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Warner Bros. Discovery, Taiwan Mobile and the Taiwan Creative Content Agency have signed a multi-year memorandum of understanding to create and distribute Taiwanese original content locally and across international markets. The MOU, signed in advance of next week’s TCCF event, combines the expertise and reach of the three companies to develop, produce and distribute local IP and content for both local and global audiences.

Naman Ramachandran Director Atlee‘s “Jawan,” starring Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan, is the highest grossing Indian film of the year with $138.6 million. With 91%, it has also become the first Indian film to surpass the 90% level critics score on Rotten Tomatoes, above Karan Johar’s “Rocky aur Rani kii Prem Kahaani” (88%) and Khan’s own “Pathaan” (83%). Atlee apprenticed with renowned blockbuster maker S.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Subscription video subscriptions in Taiwan increased by 315,000 in the July to September quarter, to reach 5.8 million, according toa new research report. Netflix and Disney+ were responsible for the bulk of the growth. The “Online Video in Taiwan” report from consultancy Media Partners Asia and its AMPD Research sister company showed premium VOD engagement and subscriptions were up 6% quarter on quarter.

Elsa Keslassy International Correspondent Paris-based company 2425 Films, recently acquired by Mediawan, is working with a pool of rising filmmakers on timely movies, including Charly Delwart’s “1,5 degré,” Ilan Duran Cohen’s “Le coup d’apres” and Thomas Kruithof’s “Les Braises.” 2425 Films, founded by Thibault Gast and Matthias Weber, has been thriving with smart, high-concept commercial movies, such as Yann Gozlan’s “La boite noire” and “An Ideal Man,” as well as the thriller “Burn Out.” The company also presented Gozlan’s latest film, “Visions,” a thriller starring Diane Kruger (co-produced by Eagle Team Entetainment) at this year’s Angouleme Film Festival. Duran Cohen’s “Le coup d’apres” is a film set in the world of French politics, with a duo of French stars, Marina Fois and Laurent Laffite, who previously co-starred in “Papa ou Maman,” a French hit comedy franchise.

North Korea. Your house is on fire. What do you try to rescue first? Your kids? Your pet? No, the first thing you reach for is the portrait of the Dear Leader, Kim Jong-un and his father and grandfather that is hanging on your wall, as mandated by the authoritarian government. Everything else can wait. 

Anna Marie de la Fuente Buenos Aires-based FilmSharks has secured the world sales and remake rights to 2000 classic “Nine Queens” (“Nueve Reinas”), newly remastered into 4K Ultra HD. Hailed by Variety as “a seductively structured and superbly acted suspenser that breathtakingly piles swindle upon scam without giving away the game until the very end,” it was written and directed by the late Fabian Bielinsky and became the biggest box office hit in his native Argentina in at least 10 years.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Vietnam-based sales agent Skyline Media has closed multi-territory deals for two of its current titles “The Soul Reaper” and “Vietnamese Horror Story.” The deals follow Skyline’s recent trip to Busan’s ACFM and come ahead of its participation as exhibitor at a string of further final quarter sales events – Tokyo’s TIFFCOM, Santa Monica’s American Film Market and Taipei’s Taiwan Creative Content Fest. Folk horror film “The Soul Reaper,” currently in the final stages of post-production, was licensed to GaragePlay for Taiwan and to Westec Media Limited (WML) for Laos, Cambodia and nine other Southeast Asian territories. The film, adapted from Thao Trang’s best-selling horror novel “Lunar New Year in Hell Village” (aka “Tet O Lang Dia Nguc”), is set to be released in Vietnam cinemas on 08 December. GaragePlay is one of Taiwan’s leading distributors, and recently handles releases of “Suzume,” “John Wick: Chapter 4” and “Someday or One Day.” WML is the biggest content distributor in Cambodia and has distributed more than 1,000 titles theatrically since its establishment.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Japanese drama film “Mountain Woman,” which was one of the standouts titles at last year’s Tokyo International Film Festival, is to be represented for global sales by EST N8. Inspired by “The Legends of Tono,” which is Japanese folklore from the Tohoku region, the film depicts a small Japanese village overrun by famine. The burden falls upon Rin, a woman whose connections with the spirit and natural worlds allow her to rise amidst familial conflicts.

It’s official: Hou Hsiao-hsien has retired from filmmaking. Deadline reports that the Taiwanese filmmaker’s family released a statement earlier this week that confirms he’s retiring after being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease.